New options make Prius pricey

High-tech features and luxury options will push the redesigned Toyota Prius into new territory--namely, $30,000-plus. The 2010 Prius hybrid will offer options found on luxury cars: systems that automatically park the car in a parallel parking space and slow the vehicle when a crash is likely. But Toyota is aware of a new competitor--the 2010 Honda Insight, a hybrid that is a little smaller and expected to be less expensive than the Prius.

U.S. woman ready to take a crack at world land-speed record

We talk power numbers at AutoWeek all day long. Three hundred horsepower used to be a lot, then 400, then 500. Now we expect our supercars to exceed even that.

Tracker launches ‘My Tracker’ & opens up a whole new market

If you have a car that costs a bit more than average, you’ve probably been told you need to fit a Tracker if you want to get it insured, so the insurance company has a fighting chance of recovering your car in quick sticks if a light-fingered lout makes off with your pride and joy. It’s a clever system that uses hidden sensors to track the car’s movements and helps the police find your car when it’s been stolen. And it’s a good business for Tracker, who have demonstrated the recovery rate of stolen vehicles is far higher when their system is fitted which means a ready market when insurance companies insist it’s fitted to high value cars.